Dundee United boss Robbie Neilson vows to fight any ban after calling out referee David Munro

Dundee United manager Robbie Neilson has vowed to fight any ban that comes his way after calling out referee David Munro for getting carried away and sending him off in Saturday’s 1-1 draw at Morton.

The United boss was sent to the stand at Cappielow by the rookie ref on 84 minutes for the language he used to shout on to the pitch from the touchline.

Robbie feels whistler Munro misconstrued his frustration at his players for abusive language aimed at the match officials.

However, the Terrors gaffer is adamant he is innocent and was only trying to pass a message on to his players on the pitch.

“I shouted on to the park to one of the players, I was quite vocal to him because I was very disappointed with something but the referee is 60 yards away and the linesman is 40 yards away and the linesman said I directed it at the referee,” he said.

“It was a young referee and I don’t think he’s refereed a lot of games, and at Morton – for me it’s a great venue even if there’s only a couple of thousand there – but it’s intense and there’s people on top of you so you have to be able to handle that tension and I think that it maybe ran away from him a wee bit.

“I’m disappointed but I’ve spoken to him and asked him a few questions, he wouldn’t answer them and he’s going to put it in his report so we’ll see.

“If you get sent to the stand every time you shout on to the pitch then I don’t think there will be anyone left in the stadium let alone the managers.

“We’ll see what happens in the next couple of days but I’ll definitely be fighting it because for me it wasn’t acceptable.

“It amazes me, it’s quite funny actually, I get players on the pitch that I shout at and they can’t hear me when they’re 15 yards away but I’ve got a referee that can hear me when he’s 60 yards away. It was interesting.

“It shouldn’t have happened, I’m disappointed it happened and I think the referee got caught up in it so I’ll put my point across, I’m sure the referee will put his point across.”

Of his team’s performance on the day, Robbie added: “Not good enough in the second half, we know that but first half we dominated, we had a lot of play, we passed it really well and got into a lot of good areas.”